Indeed, it was accepted in European medicine long before they embraced it as a food item. The Portuguese introduced potatoes, which they called 'Batata', to India in the early seventeenth century when they cultivated it along the western coast. He saw within it a means of feeding a starving nation. Though some visitors left flowers, most left potatoes, a few clearly much earlier, since they were black and quite shrivelled. It’s a shame the perception lasted so long, because the little brown stalwart is so adaptable. However, the cash crop of the Andean people was chuño: created by letting potatoes freeze overnight, then allowing them to thaw in the morning. An Irish Peasant Family Discovering the Blight of their Store, by Cork artist Daniel MacDonald, c. 1847. What Frederick did raised the spud’s standing in Prussia from unholy to sinfully delicious. Potatoes tended to become more popular in wartime due to their being able to be stored in the ground. Across most of Northern Europe, where open fields prevailed, potatoes were strictly confined to small garden plots because field agriculture was strictly governed by custom that prescribed seasonal rhythms for plowing, sowing, harvesting and grazing animals on fallow and stubble. It shows how durable the tuber is that it’s managed to survive human indifference to become one of its shopping list essentials. The potato has since spread around the world and has become a staple crop in many countries. Although potatoes had become widely familiar in Russia by 1800, they were confined to garden plots until the grain failure in 1838–39 persuaded peasants and landlords in central and northern Russia to devote their fallow fields to raising potatoes. A similar pattern occurred in England where the potato became the food of the working class. Joe Mantegna, actor, producer, director, voice actor (The Godfather Part III; Criminal Minds TV series; voice of mob boss Fat Tony on The Simpsons). [32], In Britain, the potato promoted economic development by underpinning the Industrial Revolution in the 19th century. That’s where Frederick The Great of Prussia comes in. The first written mention of the potato is a receipt for delivery dated 28 November 1567 between Las Palmas de Gran Canaria and Antwerp. On the other hand, cash-oriented landlords realised that grain was much easier to ship, store and sell, so both grain and potatoes coexisted.[31]. [4] Potatoes dating to about 2000 BC have been found at Huaynuma, in the Casma Valley of Peru,[6] and early potatoes dating to 800-500 BC were also uncovered at the Altiplano site of Chiripa on the east side of Lake Titicaca. Certainly not a fashionable idea by today’s values. [9] The fact that the Altiplanos chose to represent the potato in their vessels shows they had great social significance to the people there. Farmers then extract the water from the potato, leaving it much lighter and smaller. Jon Guttman is the research director of the World History Group. It fell to the great and the good to change the conversation. Peter Boomgaard looks at the adoption of various root and tuber crops in Indonesia throughout the colonial period and examines the chronology and reasons for progressive adoption of foreign crops: sweet potato (widespread by the 1670s), ("Irish") potato and bengkuang (yam beans) (both locally abundant by the 1780s), and cassava (from the 1860s). Some believe the growth in numbers is down to the injection of potatoes into the food chain. [16], The Spanish had an empire across Europe, and brought potatoes for their armies. Did the philosopher-king, military genius, flute virtuoso, and composer have a connection to potatoes as well? [14] Historians speculate that leftover tubers (and maize) were carried ashore and planted: "We think that the potato arrived some years before the end of the 16th century, by two different ports of entry: the first, logically, in Spain around 1570, and the second via the British Isles between 1588 and 1593 ... we find traces of the transport of potatoes travelling from the Canaries to Antwerp in 1567 ... we can say that the potato was introduced there [the Canary islands] from South America around 1562 ... the first written mention of the potato [is] ... a receipt for delivery dated 28 November 1567 between Las Palmas in the Grand Canaries and Antwerp. Heavy dependence on this potato led to disaster when the blight quickly turned harvest-ready and newly harvested potatoes into a putrid mush. Frederick also appeared to be sneakier than the average royal. Something ripe for the pilfering. Potatoes alone supply every vital nutrient except calcium, vitamin A and vitamin D. “Even peasants refused to eat from a plant that produced ugly, misshapen tubers and that had come from a heathen civilization. King Frederick the Great of Prussia, a potato proponent, inspects an early harvest. Frederick also appeared to be sneakier than the average royal. Scientists at the station even began describing their work using engineering language rather than scientific prose. During a famine in 1774, Frederick offered free potatoes to the peasants and ordered a national cultivation program. Peasants along the way adopted the crop, which was less often pillaged by marauding armies than above-ground stores of grain. Throughout Europe, the most important new food in the 19th century was the potato, which had three major advantages over other foods for the consumer: its lower rate of spoilage, its bulk (which easily satisfied hunger) and its cheapness. It arrived in Europe sometime before the end of the 16th century by two different ports of entry: the first in Spain around 1570, and the second via the British Isles between 1588 and 1593. [16][21][22] At times and places when and where most other crops failed, potatoes could still typically be relied upon to contribute adequately to food supplies during colder years. In 1770 his soldiers and their Austrian counterparts spent so much time between battles fighting over rations that that phase of the fighting became known as the “Potato War.” Frederick’s troops called his Bohemian invasion of 1778­–1779 the “Potato Campaign.”. Scholtencompany: the first Dutch industrial multinational, Summary of dissertation, University of Groningen, 2004, Steven Turner, and Heather Molyneaux, "Agricultural Science, Potato Breeding and the Fredericton Experimental Station, 1912–66. Marxist Friedrich Engels even declared that the potato was the equal of iron for its "historically revolutionary role". By the end of the 18th century, it was cultivated across northern hill areas of India. Not at Friedrich’s court: his courtiers complained about the tight budgets and insistence on self-discipline.”, King Frederick the Great of Prussia, a potato proponent, inspects an early harvest. The English privateer Sir Francis Drake, returning from his circumnavigation, or Sir Walter Raleigh's employee Thomas Harriot,[18] are commonly credited with introducing potatoes into England. [22] Potatoes were introduced to Tibet by the 19th century through the trade route from India.[28]. Frederick attempted to engage his subjects with potatoes, but received a less than rapturous response. [17] In 1553, in the book Crónica del Peru, Pedro Cieza de León mentions he saw it in Quito, Popayán and Pasto in 1538. Local peasants, noticing their king’s admiration of potato flowers as well as the tubers themselves, sneaked in to steal and plant the royal crop—exactly as Frederick had intended. In the early 1800s, a strain of potato blight (Phytophthora infestans) known as HERB-1 began to spread in the Americas, especially Central and North America destroying many crops. After Philip II received potatoes from Peru, he sent harvested tubers to the pope, who sent them to the papal ambassador to the Netherlands because he was ill. Clusius indirectly received his tubers from the ambassador; he planted them in Vienna, Frankfurt, and Leyden, and is the person who widely introduced the plant to Europe. History Magazine details the following exchange: “When he issued a 1774 order for his subjects to grow potatoes as protection against famine, the town of Kolberg replied: ‘The things have neither smell nor taste, not even the dogs will eat them, so what use are they to us?’”.

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